>>5795068Eventually, you spied your first sign of what passed for civilization here: carriage-tracks that were fresh enough to follow with your own eyes. You pointed them out, but Terzo had clicked his tongue and shaken his head.
“Not goblin,” he’d said.
“What?” you asked. “How do you know?”
He’d nodded to the footprints in the dust near to them: human-sized ones, though not human-shaped ones, and mostly traveling north and west, rather than east.
“Goblins don’t go to Hawksong to trade,” he added to the mounting body of evdience. “Not much. Not anymore, since the Prince cracked down on their lot. Cat-men and Easterlings do, though, and those raccoon men.”
“Beastmen and Eastmen, is it? Haha!” your father had laughed at his own impromptu (and rather rudimentary) wordplay.
“It’s been a few days now,” Pearce pointed out, clearly a little anxious at how slowly the journey was progressing. “If we don’t find your goblins soon, we’ll take a week just to get to them, let alone to talk to them about this mysterious research of yours and then to travel back. Maybe if we loop back and catch these traders, they’ll know where we can find the natives?”
“Oh, don’t you worry about THAT, Young Master Logan!” your father had said with a wicked grin. “If we travel just a little further out and set up camp, with a fire glowing in the dark and smoke billowing ‘til morning… The goblins will find US, and not a doubt!”
“For better or for worse,” Terzo had agreed.
“Still, I’m not the party leader on THIS particular adventure,” Rudolfo acknowledged, tipping his cap to you. “What say you, son?”
>Seek out the Eastern traders to get directions or advice—and the security of camping together>Take the carriage deeper into the Wastes, and set up camp in hopes of attracting goblin attention>Try to use your <Faerie Fire> to find a local fey spirit who can show you the way>Write-in 